Helen was in too good training by this time to swoon, though she
wanted to. She started back in alarm and exclaimed:

"Oh, how you startled me!"

Bateato circled round her like an enraged rat.

"You no fool me--I know you tief--you steal picture--I get pleece--much
pleece--whole big lot pleece, quick."

He headed for the door.

Helen pursued him, crying: "See here! Wait a minute! You don't
understand! Mr. Gladwin!"

The Jap was gone and the hall door slammed after him before she had
reached the folding doors. In another instant Travers Gladwin, who had
been making a vain hunt for a revolver in the upper part of the house
came flying down the stairs and assailed the frightened girl with
another overwhelming shock.

Seeing she was alone he threw himself into the breach headlong:

"Miss Helen, just a moment. I've been waiting for a chance to speak to
you. You must get away from here at once. Do you understand--at once!
Don't waste time talking--go quick while you have a chance. You
mustn't be mixed up in what's coming."

The girl felt that her heart would burst with its palpitations of
fear, but she was incapable of flight. Her limbs seemed like leaden
weights. Some force working without the zone of her mental control
made her stammer:

"W-w-ho are you?"

"Listen," the young man raced on, "and you must believe what I
say--this man you came here to meet and elope with is not Travers
Gladwin at all."

She expressed her horrified disbelief in a frozen stare.

"It's true," he pursued passionately. "He's an imposter! The real
Travers Gladwin you met here this afternoon. He was I; that is, I was
he. I mean I am Travers Gladwin--only I've got this uniform on now. It
is only on your account that I have not caused his arrest and a
sensation. I can't have you mixed up in a nasty scandal. I want to
save you--don't you see I do?--but I can't wait much longer."

"I don't believe what you are saying! I can't believe it! Oh, it's too
horrible!" sobbed Helen, clinging to a fragment of her shattered idol
as a drowning man clings to a straw.

Gladwin was on the point of resuming his appeal when he sensed a heavy
tread. He had divined that the picture thief had left the room to
reconnoitre emergency exits or to learn whether or not the house was
surrounded. He had hoped that he might run into Michael Phelan, but
did not stop to puzzle out why this had not happened. Backing to the
door, he whispered:

"He's coming--quest